Rage, Art, and Radical Gratitude: David Reddish on Staying Human in Terrifying Times
What do superheroes, democracy, queer visibility, political rage, yoga, gratitude, and Battlestar Galactica have in common?
Apparently… David Reddish.
In this episode of Pride Nomad Unleashed, Ken sits down with David Reddish—journalist, novelist, political commentator, creative force, and one of the sharp voices behind the Occupy Democrats YouTube channel—for a conversation that goes far beyond the headlines.
David has lived several lives already: child actor, classical vocalist, entertainment journalist, novelist, political activist, fashion designer, former go-go dancer, and now daily political commentator. But underneath the wild résumé is something more urgent: a man trying to help people stay awake, stay brave, and stay human in a moment when democracy feels frighteningly fragile.
The conversation starts with how David found his way into political commentary after years in entertainment journalism, then moves into the emotional cost of reporting on political chaos every day. As David says, he did not fully realize what it would mean psychologically to live in “all Trump, all American carnage, all the time”—but he also found something powerful in it: a voice. Not just his voice, but a way to help others channel their frustration, fear, and rage.
From there, Ken and David dig into persuasion, political division, queer visibility, and why being nice may be one of the most underrated tools in the fight for democracy. They talk about Pete Buttigieg’s ability to walk into hostile media spaces and stay calm, prepared, and human. They explore why coming out has been one of the most powerful civil rights strategies in American history, because it forces people to realize: you’re not talking about an abstract issue—you’re talking about me.
And because this is Pride Nomad Unleashed, the conversation also turns toward travel, perspective, and why Americans need to get out of their bubbles. For Ken, travel is not just escape. It is a way of building bridges, softening fear, and showing the world that queer people are not the enemy—we’re usually better dressed, more fun, and throwing the best parties.
David also brings a fascinating lens as a cultural critic, connecting political moments to the stories we tell through film, superheroes, and art. He argues that art is where we record the human experience, wrestle with morality, and learn empathy—whether through Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, It’s a Wonderful Life, Philadelphia, The Lord of the Rings, Spider-Man, or The Dark Knight.
But the episode does not stay in the darkness.
Ken asks the question we all need answered: How do you relax when you are carrying this much intensity?
David’s answer is refreshingly human: yoga, friends, trivia, wine, creativity, making things with his hands, and radical gratitude. He talks about the need for creative people to create—because when creative energy has nowhere to go, it can become destructive.
By the end, this becomes one of the most unexpectedly hopeful conversations in the Pride Nomad Unleashed archive. Yes, the world is chaotic. Yes, democracy is under pressure. Yes, the news can feel like poison. But there are still flowers blooming, friends laughing, books being written, art being made, and people brave enough to keep speaking.
And sometimes, that is where the fight begins.
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Rage, Art, and Radical Gratitude: David Reddish on Staying Human in Terrifying Times
Meet David Reddish. How a prodigy turned Hollywood wild card who’s basically living his own superhero origin story, minus the radioactive spider bite, as far as we know. This dude was speaking full sentences at nine months old while the rest of us were still figuring out which end of the bottle they suck on but that was just the beginning of this villain worthy character arc.
The award-winning journalist went from writing plays in his living room, depending on a book called Sex, Drugs & Superheroes, which is exactly as wild as it sounds? Need more plot twists? He's also been a child actor, a classical vocalist and a go-go dancer turned political activist and fashion designer, who somehow found time to become Occupy Democrats most savage voice. Think of Tony Stark as a journalist with better fashion sense and zero filter. This is Pride Nomad Unleashed with brash commentary means unfiltered us authenticity.
Hello, David Reddish.
Ken, you flatter me with your introduction. Thank you.
God bless AI. How did Occupy Democrats help? Which is why I found you.
The Accidental Commentator Hook
In my life or just in general?
In your life.
It's been fairly recent. I was working as a journalist, so I was primarily known as the novelist, which you referred to in the introduction. I have four books in publication. The most recent which came out in 2025. I was also an entertainment journalist. I've been in the business for many years and I've written for a variety of different publications. Entertainment journalism has changed in recent days. Not necessarily for the better.
I had been working as a managing editor and had been laid off. I was deciding what my next chapter was going to be and I saw an ad for, “We're looking for a political commentator.” It’s because of my background in politics. I had written on politics before but very little. I was primarily known for entertainment journalism, so I reached out to them and I agreed to screen test. They hired me on the spot, so here I am.
How long has it been going on?
The channel is not even a year old. I've only been doing it full-time since January 2026.
That's pretty awesome. You’re doing a fabulous job. Let's face it. We need the voice and we will certainly now more than ever. There's so much more at stake. It's important for us to be out there up front, taking names and going forward with it. How do you manage the emotion of that every day? You're carrying a lot of stuff.
Staying Sane Amid American Carnage
That's a very interesting question. To be perfectly honest with you, when I was offered the job and said yes, I didn't stop to think about what that was going to mean for me psychologically or emotionally. It was going to be all Trump, all American Carnage all the time and it is, or it certainly has been since I've started. I think it's going to be that way for the foreseeable future. I do have dreams about Trump and Elon Musk. Lord, help me. It is true. They're not pleasant dreams either.
The thing that I didn't expect was that we need the voice. We all need the voice. We needed to find it in ourselves as much as we needed to find it culturally. This is a place for me to express my thoughts, my frustration and my rage. I'm lucky that I get to go to work every day and do something that is both personal to me, the way this is. I believe very deeply in American values and the values of democracy.
I absolutely hate what's happening in our country. It's a way for me to voice that and to share that with other people. People all over the world, by the way. We have an international viewership, which was also a huge surprise when I joined up with the staff. People all over the world are disturbed by this. I'm lucky that I found this way to connect with them and for them to channel their own frustration, range and moment.
I will not even use the word of the life form that occupies the White House. I refuse to even use the name. I'm doing a Steven Colbert before because it's troublesome to me. Also, I wasn't watching the news and I ended up at a breakfast with Kathy Reno who's the media person for the National LGBT taskforce. I told her I wasn't watching the news because she's giving me all this information. I was like, “I didn't know that.” She’s like, “Ken, you must watch the news. You can't not stick your head down,” and she's not wrong.
We are done asking for permission to exist in spaces that refuse to see us. It's time to build your borderless reign.
Fighting for Democracy Beyond Borders
What you're doing and what everyone else is doing to that end is super important. At Pride Nomad, we're talking about being digital nomads, which was long before the election. Running a nomadic life far precedes. I left the States in 2009. My contention is that even as we travel, we are still fighting for democracy. We're still fighters for freedom. We're still laying a foundation certainly for LGBTQ causes. At the very least work, we're teaching people that we're not the enemy. We live in countries that are not welcoming to us, but when the commoners recognize that we're cool. We dress better. We play better music.
You have all the best parties.
Absolutely. It's like, “I want to be in that game.” There's a better hope for. I look at it from our part as nomadic people. These people still come to the US and are pneumatic with the 50 states, plus Canada. By the way, are you Canadian because I hear the accent?
I'm not. I was born in Illinois. I have a very odd accent. I've lived all over the country.
I read the Florida part and I'm like, “You're confusing me.” It's important. Where do you see the story arc for you taking this thing out? You've done so many different things from the go-go dancer part to the books. What's the long-term game for you, do you think?
Why We Lost Faith in Our Institutions
No one's quite asked me that question in those terms before. What I've always sought out to do with my work, whether that be as a little kid when I was doing theater or singing. Which you do not want me to do now or as an author or as a journalist and now, as an anchor. I've always been about connecting with other people. More importantly, inspiring other people to dream bigger, to be better people, and to make for a better Planet.
When we all better ourselves, we’re automatically making the world a better place. It's to inspire people to be the best they can be to believe and to have faith. That's on multiple levels and different institutions. We're living through a period when it comes to politics where we don't have faith in our American institutions anymore.
We can have a very long conversation as to why that is. There's no single reason, but it's something that's hit a boiling point in many years. When we don't have faith in our institutions in the United States, because we are sensibly, a democracy and a republic, we are losing faith in ourselves. I want people to find faith and inspiration in themselves and in the people they love to make to make America great again. America's always great, but we are at our best when we are trying to be the more perfect union.
That's a great way to put it. I wish we could bring back Jimmy Stewart.
You're probably talking more about his on-screen image of Mr. Smith Goes to Washington. Every man who could do great things and we kind of had that in the early 2000s. This opens up a longer conversation, which you may or may not want to go all the way into this. There was a moment, certainly in my lifetime, in my adult life when we did have that belief. It was in the early 2000s when you saw movies.
I have a thesis that art is always reflective of the moment and the things that are very popular in a moment are reflective of what people are feeling and thinking. In 2001-2002, you had X-Men, Spiderman, Harry Potter, the Lord of the Rings, Star Wars, and the Phantom Menace. Not long after that, you have Batman Begins. These are huge hit genre movies, but all of them are about ordinary people that have to become extraordinary or extraordinary people that have to lead. As I say, there are many reasons why that particular moment.
Obviously, Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter had been inspiring. These were not new characters. They've been around forever, but the reason they took hold of that moment, the reason those movies finally got made, the reason people were clamoring to see them was because they spoke to something in the American consciousness. A lot of it relates to 9/11, frankly. The myth that we were told at the time, George W. Bush's this average IQ, average salt of the earth guy. He's been propelled into this great position of power, faith and destiny. He is going to save the world.
That's true of all the characters I mentioned. That falls apart about 2005 or 2006 or 2007. In those years, you have X-Men the Last Stand, which is a terrible movie. The X-Men are all hypocrites. You have Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith where Anakin Skywalker, who's the chosen one to save the Galaxy goes crazy and just murders his entire brotherhood and compromises all his principles.
You have the Dark Knight in 2008. The year George W. Bush leaves office, which is all about the escalation of trying to bend the rules and go outside of them. Not understanding what it is that you're doing in the effect that's going to have and how something is going to become much bigger than you're prepared to confront. That's a very roundabout way of answering your question. We need to put faith in our institutions again and we need to believe in ourselves again.
Traveling the world is a political act. It shows the communities we visit that we aren't the enemy, we're just living fully.
Persuasion Through Radical Politeness
I hadn't thought about it that way and obviously, because of your journalistic history, you've got a better beat on it. This is interesting. As a persuader and I’ve been a speaker for 40 plus years, our job even from a journalism standpoint, is to get a point across. Hopefully, with that point, we can educate, enlighten and inspire. The keyword is inspire. I wonder what they're doing now. The day is even still us. You're doing your gig with Occupy Democrats, which is super important. More than likely, my suspicion is you're not going to change too many minds because the opposition is probably not watching you. Maybe I'm wrong.
That opens up a whole other interesting line of questioning. I told my mom and dad when I told them that I was going to do this job and I was going to go ahead with it. I said, “You'll know I've succeeded when I am getting death threats,” because that means I'm getting under the Trumper's skin. I'm happy to say I have gotten some hate. That means I'm doing something right. It's a frightening barometer but it's true.
People do watch. People who are not Democrats who don't believe in liberal over progressive causes, do watch the channel. They get very angry. For one thing, it speaks to a certain curiosity that they have that they are watching in the first place. They're going to put their energy into the nasty comments about what we're saying or the way I look or how stupid we all are for following these stories or what have you.
Journalism is at a very pivotal point because people don't just want lists of facts. They are more interested in the commentary, the talking heads, in the opinion and the analysis. There are many reasons for that. How do you get through to the other side? By being honest and by being steadfast in what you're reporting. Not compromising. Not spinning something into, “This is a big win for Democrats because it's a Trump screw up.” It isn't. That just means Trump screwed up and we're all going to suffer.
Does it mean he's less credible and that may convince voters to be like, “I want to be rid of this guy forever. His ideologies are totally discredited?” That is a good thing. It's also a dangerous thing because we saw that in 2006 with George W. Bush, where the traditional Reagan, Republican even the next Sony and Republican posture and image of the party. It’s these wealthy people who are maybe compassionate.
They care about low taxes and less government. George W. Bush compromises every single one of those values. You hear other political adults talk about the McCain Republicans. That's a very narrow period because John McCain was only the standard bearer of the party in one election. Prior to that, he was generally overshadowed by other figures of the party.
That's how you end up with Trumpism because Bushism, Reaganism, that brand of the Republican party was so thoroughly discredited and so thoroughly despised by the American public. The only way the Republican party could rebrand itself was to take on this populism. I hate calling it populism because it's not real populism. Taking on a certain population's posture that is intertwined with the worst anxiety and impulses of their voters.
It's sad. How do we change minds? Especially when they're so deeply entrenched. I'm hosting a friend of mine and walking the dog. I walked into the street and at the end of the street, in front of two very expensive homes in Fort Lauderdale, were two very large signs for you who. Having a sign for that person at this time, to me, is a giant fuck you. It's a giant fuck you to the world because the election is over. Put it away.
That's an independent statement. It's almost like to me, I look at the guys with the Tesla mistake machine that they're driving around. To me, that's almost like the old Hummers. It's like, “I have a small penis. Let's go tell everybody.” The thing that I find interesting in terms of how do we persuade, how do we enlighten, and how do we non-threateningly introduce another view without getting into backing people up to defend themselves is people to judge. He's dancing on Fox and they love having him it seems. He makes mincemeat of them. It's brilliant. It's great posturing for a presidential run. I think it's brilliant what he's doing. I wouldn't be surprised but that's what he is doing. Whether he consciously realizes that or not.
Spoiler alert. That's what he's doing.
Shocker. The other side is not familiar with him. He's a voice of reason. He's not making them wrong. He's laying a foundation that's straight on. He appears to be unbiased in terms of the ways presenting himself. I believe that's a solid way to do that rather than saying, “You're wrong.” It’s a smart way to stay level. I don't know how he does it, quite honestly. It’s going to take a lot of self-control but guess what? That's what we need in the White House anyway.
The Power of Coming Out
Bushism is an amazing guy. Extraordinarily intelligent. He's lived through a lot. He tours in the military and Afghanistan, and being closeted at that time when the military was hostile towards queer people. He has a high tolerance for discomfort in my suspicions, but he doesn't shy away from a fight either. To your question, the idea that he is nice.
You get through to people by being friendly, by being nice and by saying, “Let's talk about the uncomfortable thing because we're friends.” We’re all willing to talk with people we trust about things that are controversial or things that we don't understand or things that are frightening. Things that make us uncomfortable because that rapport is what grants comfort. He's granting the rapport. He's going on Fox News and you're right, he is making Ministry of these people because he's going in, he's prepared, thoughtful, polite and well-mannered.
That's how you get through uncomfortable conversation no matter what they are about. It baffles me that this is so bewildering to so many people. If you look at, for example, the LGBT rights movement. We are the most successful Civil Rights Movement in American history. We accomplished more in less time and gained more acceptance than any others. Now, granted we were building off of women's suffrage. We were building off the Civil Rights Movement for people of color. We were building off of Cesar Chavez and immigrants rates. We had other stars to follow on our journey. At the same time, part of the reason we were so successful was we could come out.
We had to go to our families and say, “I hear what you say about gay people. You need to know you're saying that about me.” We could go to our co-workers and say, “I hear what you say about trans people and I want you to know I am trans. Please rethink what you're saying because you're hurting my feelings.” That is how you get things done. It's by putting it on the line personalizing it. When you talk about these issues, it's so easy to talk about tran’s rights or immigrant’s rights or women's rights or rights to health care. All these political issues in the abstract.
It's easy to fight about them, and it makes for fun television and fun debates to watch wherever the case may be. It's great to listen to the Angry Guy show. There are so many angry dude shows now. I don't think it accomplishes very much. It validates people's anger. It gives them an outlet for that. It gives them a sense of belonging. We'll circle back to this in a second because I want to say something about the Trump sign you saw on the lawn. This is really interesting.
It's easy to find a place where you can hear your own voice echo. The echo chamber. It's harder to put things on the line and to say to somebody, “You're talking about me. This is how this is affecting my life.” When you go to the ballot box, when you talk about this with people, you go on your social media because that is a huge part of our political conversation now for better or mostly worse, in my view. You need to know what you’re talking about me.
People will say, “You're different. When I talk about immigrants, I'm not talking about you. When I'm talking about queer people, I'm not talking about you. I'm talking about the other people, the abstract.” One thing that's interesting to me about Trump voters is you hear that he made inroads with people of color, with immigrants and what have you because they bought into, “He's not talking about me. He's talking about everybody else.” Now, they are seeing the reality and it's not what they thought they were voting for.
Keeping that righteousness is very important. For some people to say that they were wrong is hard. I was in a relationship with someone that way. His saying, “I'm wrong. I'm sorry,” couldn't possibly happen. God forbid.
It's a hard thing to do, admittedly. I’m in the same boat. It is a hard thing to admit you’re wrong.
Think of it, we’re marketers. Essentially, running a newsletter for LGBTQ digital nomads, there's two sides to this. There's the travel and then there's the side of how you run your business and fund your travel. You have to have some business situation. We talked about businesses as well. To me, everything we do is persuasion. You talked about being nice. I've been teaching for decades that the two words that are most important in having any successful business is be nice, period. Be nice to people and they will be nice to you.
All over the world. If you just smile, it's amazing what people will do for you. It's a shame that online, we've seen so much not nice. You'll see someone in person and you're much more likely to be nice. If everyone was moved to a tropical island, I'll tell you why I'm saying that. I used to live in Saint Croix in the US Virgin Islands. I moved there in 1988 just before hurricane Hugo. My ex and I moved down there. We put together a mortgage company down there. On an island of 50,000 people, I learned that you can yell at someone and be a real dick. Ten minutes later, they're behind you in the grocery line.
You can't be the impersonal asshole, that being a technical term, that you would in an anonymous situation. You have to learn to get along with people. That's what happens in a small town. That's why we see small town values that are different from the Middle America values as they were. They’re nice people. That's why Canadians are so nice. I don't know, but I think about this as a persuasion campaign.
We need to look at that as a business. It's a marketing piece. If we look at it from that standpoint and look at the psychology of this. How do we best persuade? You don't persuade someone to buy a different laundry detergent by saying that, whatever it is, it’s wrong. You've got to give them a reason to switch. Unless they're in pain and the thing they’re using hasn't worked, they're not going anywhere.
That's very true. You talk about small town values. I'm from a town of 2,000 people in the Midwest. I've seen the bright and dark sides of small town America. This is a whole other aspect of American culture, where you hear about the urban and rural divides. People in small towns must all be ignorant racists that are marrying their cousins. People in the cities must all be transgender communists that eat babies. I've done both of these. You could ask me guys.
You’ve eaten babies? I did know it.
I have not. It’s not in my dial. When we talk about the frustration that is at the root of both of these accusations, is the same frustration that everybody is feeling. It's very hard to understand where those forces are coming from because we live in a globalized community now. Economics is all globalized, which is why these tariffs arise and are only going to hurt everybody. Not just Americans, but Americans most of all. That's an issue, but when people say, “I want the factory back in my town.” It's like, “Do you want the noise? Do you want the pollution?” Probably not.
Do you want to work there? I'm guessing probably not. What you want is the picture of America with a thriving middle class. There are different reasons we don't have a middle class in this country anymore. They have less to do with a changing economy with less industrialization in this country. Although, that is an element but that's something that's unavoidable at this point because everything is globalized and people don't want to pay $30,000 for an iPhone. They don't want to pay $10 a pound for bananas in the winter time.
They want their free trade and their low prices. It's a complicated issue. We need to address why there is no middle class of this country anymore. That is at the root of so much of what we're talking about. Particularly on the subject of anger. The anger that you have towards the other. Whether it be another community, different lifestyle, different ways or different age group. Whatever it may be. There's the anger of, “I'm unhappy in my life.”
True persuasion doesn't happen by screaming in echo chambers. It starts when you stay calm, civil, and completely human.
You got it. That's what it is
If I am unhappy, it must mean someone else is happy. Forget that we can all be unhappy at the same time or we could all be happy at the same time. That gets into maybe more difficult conversations that politicians are afraid to have, frankly.
The thing is, my contention has been that if you're happy you're less likely to judge other people because you don't give a shit about all the other extra stuff because you're comfortable with who you are. If we can teach people to create happiness in their own lives, they're less likely to kill other people and on and on. That's a big goal.
There's a couple more questions I'm going to ask you. As we talked about the media and film and so on. From a persuasion standpoint, how can we subliminally introduce content that's entertaining and high value? Let's go back to Sesame Street. It was designed to educate kids and get them value. What are we doing in television, in film, in YouTube videos and so on, that can teach people the values of Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, or is courageous? Moreover, I don't think we're going to change the minds and hearts of people above 40 and up or 30 and up, but three. The kids are our future. I don't think that people that are unfortunately of age are going to be that easy to shift.
In fact, kids are the future. I hate that song that goes, “I believe the children are our future.” You believe that? That's the reality. What are you singing about? To your point, on the subject of art, I've said this before and it's a horrifically bombastic thing to say but it's something that I believe very deeply. I will say it again. I believe very deeply in the arts as a place where we examine and record the human experience and where we confront the moral and ethical delays that you and I are talking about. The issues that are at the core of the bigger issues that we’ve seen in the political sphere. The very most fundamental term.
In my view, you could argue that you'll find as much more reality in a novel by Dickens or Hugo, as you will in the Bible or a song by the Beatles or a film by Bergman or Scorsese or Capra. The reason is it's not just that these works of our confront morality. It's that they do so in an honest and sincere way. We've already talked about being friendly, honest, and genuine. You win people over because you're able to have difficult conversations.
The power of a movie like It's Wonderful A Life or Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, is in the steadfastness. Frank Capra believed in these things. Jimmy Stewart believed in the values they were supporting. You can consider a film to bring it back to something more contemporary. You consider films like Philadelphia, which comes out of the height of the AIDS epidemic. I hear many queer film buffs criticize it now for like, “It's made for straight people. It's so heteronormative.”
You're missing what that story was, which was a cry for empathy. You see these are just human beings who are following their hearts when it comes to gay people. Now, they're in this terrible situation. We just stand here and let it happen because we're not comfortable with the physical act of love making that these people engage in.
The thing that people need to remember. This is my contention. Certainly, we need to meet people where they are. We shoot ourselves as a cause in the apps when we do things like pride parades or pride marches. Who are they for? I'm one level there, so we can express ourselves freely, and that's wonderful.
To me, it's a marketing campaign to show the population that we're not weirdos and crazies. We’re not going to eat their children and recruit them. We're not giving out toasters. When we have people that are in those events that are fringe, and I'm not saying that running around with whips and chains and being half naked is fun in the proper genre. If we're doing a PR campaign, it's off brand. I can get beat up for that because I'm one level strict with your behavior. Guess what? If what we're trying to do is change the hearts and minds of people by making them feel comfortable. Let's not stick shit in their face that they’re not ready to see.
I understand what you're saying. On one level, I do think that is true. In the case of pride specifically, I think of it more as a family party. Every family celebrates Christmas or the 4th of July or whatever holiday, in its own way. Pride has become a commercial experience because corporations want to be seen as compassionate so they donate money. Politicians likewise. People just want to be seen as tolerant and culturally relevant.
Now, the friends from next door come to our family's house for the party. If they're going to come to our party, they need to be prepared for the kind of conversation and behavior that we do behind closed doors. Pride is just a bubble of that. If you're going to have the topless lesbians, the naked go-go boys and the drag queens and everything is showing up to something that is more serious like a political debate.
I don't know if that is the best way to further your agenda or the best way to be an ally. Pride is where people need to meet us on our terms. While there is a dimension to it, that is absolutely PR. Pride is one month out of the year. It's a weekend out of the year if you're going to your local pride festival or whatever.
There's two sides to that whole equation. I can play both sides. I want to ask you something. You are very intense in what you believe, as we all are. How do you relax?
Radical Gratitude and the Creative Escape
I do yoga twice a week, for starters. I found, especially as a man of a certain age, that it is very healthy and very helpful. I spent a lot of time with my friends. I play on a trivia team once a week. I love to meet friends in the afternoon on the weekends to sit outside and have a nibble, drink some wine and have a few laughs. Talk about what's going on in our lives and who we’re dating. What else is going on culturally and just making fun of it all. Listening to some nice music along the way.
When you refuse to create, that bottled-up energy turns destructive. Find your creative outlet and protect your sanity.
Both of those are very therapeutic to me. As a creative person myself, I have to have a creative outlet all the time. This also gets into a pretentious but higher level of conversation. I think everybody has the ability to be creative but for some people, it's as natural as breathing. It's not just part of your character. It's part of your being. In other words, you necessitate creativity to live. I'm one of those people, first of all. The thing that I realized both through observation and through trial and error is, if you are a creative person compulsively and you're not creating. You're going to become destructive very quickly because that energy has to go somewhere.
This is why you see so many actors or artists or musicians with drug problems, alcohol problems or mental illness. There's a reason that this is all happening to a certain type of person. It's because they're not creating all the time or their creativity is under incredible pressure or they're hampered or whatever. To relax, I always like to do things that are creative. I'm an author, so I write books. I'm a painter. I'm finishing up a painting.
I make a lot of my own clothes. Nothing I'm wearing but I saw. I sculpt. I always make my own notebook because as a journalist and a writer, notebooks are like a hand. They're like appendages that go with you everywhere. I always make my own books. This is made with special ultra lite weight paper, hard bound and leather. I designed it and built it all.
What is in the front?
It says visions.
In what language?
In Quenya, Elvish.
What is that?
It’s one of Tolkien's languages. Tolkien who wrote Lord of the Rings. He developed all kinds of different languages for his cultures or whatever. That's one of them that I just thought was pretty, so I picked that one.
It's cute. Anyone can write in English or Spanish or Hebrew but that's unique. That's very cute.
I like to mix it up, as I say. For me, relaxing is not always the easiest thing. As long as I’m doing something creative, as long as I'm around people I love, that's very helpful to me.
It's important because burnout is a real thing. You made an important point and I want to add an exclamation point to it. If you're not doing what you're wired to do, you're not going to be happy. We're creatives because I've experienced this. If you take one of the Kolbe tests, which is a personality test based upon it. Where do you fit in the scheme of things? Kathy Kolbe created this test. When I experienced it, you’re categorized in, are you a fast starter? You like to get things started, but you never want to finish anything because you're creative. Are you a plotter that gets stuff done? Likes the consistency of the constant thing? Are you a finisher that likes to just get things finished up?
I’m absolutely a starter. I get bored very easily. If I'm stuck doing the same shit every day, I'm miserable. You nailed it. For all of you people watching, if you feel miserable, why are you fucking miserable? You’re probably not doing what you should be doing or you’re wired to do. It's an important distinction, because if we want to create happiness, and if happiness is a foundation of joy and peace, not killing people and being able to face uncomfortable conversations because we're comfortable enough with ourselves to not feel threatened. Maybe we need to look at what's going to make us happy. Shocking and revolutionary is that concept.
Happiness is underrated somehow. It is. We tend to think about things, material things as being synonymous with happiness. Sometimes, they are emblematic of that but happiness is something much deeper. I talked about that quite a bit. I don't think I was ever happy until I was into my twenties. I remember the exact moment when I realized, “This is what it means to be happy,” as in fundamentally things are good. I'm good. I'm good with people around me. I’m in a good place.
Isn't it cool the things I get to do with my life? That is a very precious feeling. In an earlier conversation, many people are afraid that they will someday be unhappy or that things will get too hard for them to be happy. They become so precious and so anxious about it that they don't realize how unhappy they are already making themselves. I recommend everyone try happiness. It's a nice thing.
It is. Someone gave a quote that said, “You're only as happy if you allow yourself to be.” Maybe it's Mark Twain. I’m not sure. The lessons that I've got as a traveler were in Bali a number of years ago. I was on the Caribbean beaches. The Caribbean are significantly better than the beach. I can tell you having lived in Saint Croix and Saint John for years. I had hired a driver and a guy to take me around on my first trip. They were making like $14 a day but they were the happiest people I’ve ever met.
They had their family. They had their Temple. Life is good. They weren't doing any of this other stuff. They were just happy. It’s amazing. I was in Cambodia, at Siem Reap. Seeing the old temples. They’re thousand years old and so on. I'm being driven to the next location and these 4 or 5 year old kids were on the side of the street. They have big smiles and are waving. It’s just pure joy. Here we are, here I am, type A. Owning I've got to have the next thing or I've got to have the next ambition. Fuck that.
When you have a stroke or a heart attack or are stuck in bed and you can't do anything else. You realize, none of this shit we've been driving for matters. We get down to the fundamentals of that. I learned that. When the crash hit back to 2008-2009, I theoretically lost everything. That was millions of dollars of houses. I lost a multimillion-dollar project in Central America, on and on. I had a heart attack due to the stress. It was a bad thing. Having technically lost everything, I'm going to Thailand. Funny, I was happy. I was having the best food in the world. I didn't have to worry about car insurance or that $15,000 a month mortgage. That was crazy that I got stuck with.
I feel guilty about it because I lost all this money and investors lost money and all this. I couldn't allow myself to fully experience happiness, but it was like I had theoretically nothing, but had everything. It's an important lesson that people need to learn. It’s interesting what it changed. That's one reason why I left the States. I left because economically, it was easier to. The culture was just driving me crazy. How we've gotten to be Kardashian-y. We're so wrapped up in all the social stuff. I could care less, but that whole thing about that. Who cares? It doesn't affect your life or mine. Why are we focusing on this stuff?
The world would be a better place if we just simply worked together as a team rather than these isolationist countries, hoarding bombs and food and all this. It's incredible. We see it happening. You see with the war in Ukraine. That’s affected the food supply in the entire world. Yet the world's not coming together as much as they should to stop the madness because all of us are fucked up by that. I was in Australia when it was going on. Do you think that we're so far away in Australia? No. Foods supply was fucked up there too.
That is due in large part to bad leadership, unfortunately, here in the States, particularly in Russia. The Ukrainians are lucky that they have good leadership. Strong leadership, wise leadership and steadfast resolute leadership. They're not going to back down anytime soon. Who knows what Donald Trump believes. I don't know that he ever believed he was going to end the war. I don't think he cared. I think he just says anything in a moment because he thinks that's what's convenient.
Marco Rubio is an intelligent enough person to know this was going to be a disaster, but he is now trapped in this position that he can't get out of because he's maybe trying to do the right thing. If you remember, there was the anonymous bed that was published in the New York Times during Trump's first term by a member of the resistance inside from administration that was talking about the people that are trying to pour real Republican, real conservative priorities and real American priorities.
All the insanity. There are far less of those people this time. I'm not saying Marco Rubio necessarily is one of those people because I'm not fully convinced that he is. I'm hoping that somebody there is because at a certain point that inaptitude is going to come back to bite us like with a global pandemic or a marketing meltdown or a terrorist attack. It's a bit of a digression to say, but it still irks me to know that George W. Bush allowed 9/11 to happen being the boss.
He had delegated these duties to Condoleezza Rice who was derelicting her duties as National Security advisor to act on the intelligence that she was given that an attack was imminent and to coordinate with the FBI, CIA and NSA to make sure it did not succeed. She didn't do that because she didn't know what Al-Qaeda even was at that time. George Tenant, who was CIA director, neither of them should be allowed to resign.
Tenant gets the Presidential Medal of Honor. Condoleezza Rice became Secretary of State. We're failing upward. That, unfortunately, has also become synonymous with conservatism in this country. It's an awful, gross thing to be a nepo baby and to constantly fail upward. Whereas some of us try our whole lives to call our way ahead and it doesn't matter how good we are. If we didn't go to the right school, if we're not related to the right people.
We've been going on for a while and it’s a pleasure. We’re having fun. I want to leave on a high note so that we're not running to get razor blades. It's why I don't watch the news in the morning. I certainly don't watch the news before I go to sleep at night. These are the rules in my world. What positives can we leave people with?
It depends on how you look at it. First of all, most people still love Americans for all our many flaws, which we could do a whole episode on. People who hate the Trump Administration, who hate the political actions of the United States still like Americans. They like our culture. They like our spirit. They like our people. One of the biggest failings of Americans is that they do not travel internationally enough or even domestically enough. We tend to be confined to our own little regions. If I had to give a message to most Americans, it would be, go overseas and tell me what you see.
For me, doing that as a kid, that was extremely formative and brought me a lot of perspective that I still rely on. Other things to be positive about, people love the United States. The nations of Europe are coming together in a way that they have not since World War II, in my opinion. They are finding a way for the European Union to be a global leader. That does mean we're compromising our own leadership position in the United States.
There is something to be said for them taking on more of the cost of defending freedom worldwide. We have such a bloated defense budget. When people complain about, “We're giving aid to Ukraine and Israel. We're giving them billions of dollars to buy bombs.” Do you know where they're buying the bombs? They’re buying them from Americans and that's the dirty secret we don't want to talk about. They’re war profiteering. There's that.
It's good that people are going to be willing to not need us to drag them down the road. President Roosevelt used to refer to working with Winston Churchill as pushing him uphill in a wheelbarrow because he was so difficult. He loved Winston Churchill. They were very close, but friends that truly loved one another. Stalin and Churchill did not like each other. That was the genius of Roosevelt. That he was not able to broker this incredible event that saved the world. That's not an exaggeration. They did save the world. It’s wild to think about. Other things to be positive about. I would say go to oral hygiene but we're all going to lose the fluoride in our water in the near future. Donuts are plentiful.
You can find the entire series Battlestar Galactica streaming on various services. I highly recommend you check it out, or Tender Mercies. I'll say this. When I hear your question, more of what you are getting at. Something that I know is being beneficial to me is gratitude, radical gratitude. I'm glad it's a beautiful day. It can be something as simple as that. I'm glad the flowers are blooming. I'm glad that my bed feels so comfy. I'm glad I ran into so and so. I'm glad I had this for dinner.
Radical gratitude isn't some soft concept. It's a survival strategy for staying sane in a highly chaotic world.
You can also be glad that you're a millionaire. You have an Academy Award or you're a rock star or you have a hard cash unit or you have a million Instagram followers. Be thankful for that, but there's something to be said for I'm healthy. There's something to be said for, I have people around me that I love or I have basic necessities.
I'm living in a time where I don't have to worry about gangrene being the number one thing that kills me or that the human life expectancy is 40 years old because there's plague all over the world. Although, with RFK, who knows. We have indoor plumbing. There's a lot. The more history of mankind that you know, the more you realize that in this age as messed up and chaotic as it is, it's also the most sophisticated, wealthiest, most advanced, and one of the most exciting times in history to be alive.
That is true. Things are changing so quickly. You said it right. Walking down the street and smelling a flower is miraculous like night Jasmine and honeysuckle. It’s those things. If we do take the time and have a gratitude journal. That's not new agey bullshit. That's 100% real. Doing yoga and being stillness to just let things settle and not be so hyped all the time. When you're in that state of hyped up, how can you be reasoned? How can you do anything that makes any sense? If we are just leveling things out, it helps. It has been a pleasure to get to know you. You're awesome.
Thank you. you flatter me.
I’m good at that, but I'm serious. It's nice to have intelligent conversations. Moreover, it's nice to be with someone that's passionate about what they do. It's important. I want to tell you please fucking be careful. Not just please be careful. Keep doing what you're doing because we need to know that we're heard. We need to know that we matter and we're not alone. There are other people that are paying closer attention than I am, for example.
We do need the people that are willing to take those extra steps. We do those people that are the Martin Luther King's. That is the Harvey milks. Those are the people that stood up for us and then we'll continue to do that and take that leadership position in spite of what common sense may be. I am amazed at some of those folks that I’ve met. It's insane. It's incredible. To them, I’m ever so grateful.
I'll leave you with this. Since I worked in political journalism. Winston Churchill said something interesting about the United States. He said, “They always do the right thing last. After trying everything else first.” Winston was on to something with that. I don't know if it's true all the time, but Americans are extremely brave people. We're tough and resourceful. We’re durable people. This is a terrible time we're living through now, but we will do the right thing, eventually. When we do, we'll have to be brave, but then we will be the America that we want to believe we always are.
He also said, “If you're going through hell, keep going.”,
True story.
We have to. David Reddish, thank you so much for being with us. I am so grateful for you. I wish you the best. Let's for sure stay in touch. The Occupy Democrats, is seen where?
You can find the Occupy Democrats Channel on YouTube where I will be doing several segments a day. You can also find me personally on Instagram at @TheGayMagneto.
I love that. Thank you again for being with us. Everybody, I’ll catch you on the next episode.
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About David Reddish
David Reddish is a political commentator, journalist, and the award winning novelist behind The Passion of Sergius & Bacchus and the Sex, Drugs & Superheroes series. He's also an acclaimed political analyst with Occupy Democrats and a noted entertainment journalist, having written for such publications as MovieWeb, CBR, Queerty, and Playboy.
